The Hedgewitch Queen

I penetrated the mysteries of the North Tower a short way and found nothing but decay. I climbed to the third level, where some of the windows had not been sealed, and found a room with wan sunlight coming from a high casement, piercing the gloom. Dust lay in great sheets over everything, and the furniture was covered in white drapes grown gray and moth-eaten with years. I took two more steps and sank to the floor, buried my face in my filthy, sweating hands, and proceeded to weep like an absolute fool.

* * *

The storm of tears did not last as long as I thought it would, since I was too hungry and exhausted to cry much more. So I did the only thing I could — gathered up the dress and the bag and carried them further up into the Tower until I found a half-hidden door behind a rotting tapestry of Elisaine’s crest. This led into a sitting room, close and still and cold as all the Tower, even in the late-spring heat. I changed into Arioste’s gown with shaking hands. I had no servant girl to help me, so it took two or three tries, but the lacings were relatively easy.

With that done, I tossed a dusty sheet back to reveal a frightfully old divan done in faded red and gold satin, chewed by gods alone knew how many tiny animals but sound enough. I sank down, dropping the bag of fruit and other things next to me, tucking the strap as if I were arranging an embroidery bag prettily on one of Lisele’s wide sophas.

Another wave of faintness went through me at the thought. I shook it away, transferred the keys to my new skirt-pocket, and fished the thing Lisele had given me out of my old skirt as well.

I opened my fingers, found my palm full of a medallion that occupied my hand to the first joints in my fingers, with a thick antique silver chain. The medallion itself was three serpents twisted in a complex knot — copper, silver, and black gold, set with rubies and clear glittering diamonds for eyes.

The world slipped from beneath me again.

It was the Aryx, the Great Seal of Arquitaine. It lay cool and weighty in my hand, the source of all Court sorcery and the servant of the bloodline of Edouard Angouleme, however diluted in the house of Tirecian-Trimestin. It belonged in the possession of the King. Why had Lisele had it — and why had she given it to me?

If the Duc’s men had found it, they would have taken it to the Duc, and he would be the king in truth. I touched the medallion with one trembling finger smudged with garden-dirt and blood. I had scrubbed my fingers on my green velvet, but it did very little to help. Lisele is the Heir — of course she would hold it sometimes; the Festival of Skyfall is soon, and the reigning monarch and the Heir pass the Aryx between them at sundown. The whys and wherefores matter not a whit. It only matters that you do not let the Duc find it. Lisele charged you with keeping it safe.

I found the clasp and fastened the chain about my own throat with trembling fingers, silently praying it would not take a notion to fry me for my insolence. The histories said the royal family of Arquitaine knew the secret to using the Aryx as a weapon, but it had not happened since the time of King Fairlaine’s suicide, after the death of his beloved Queen Toriane. Since then, we had not needed the Aryx’s power in battle or in the defense of the King’s person. King Fairlaine’s death had brought the Great King Tibirius to the throne, and he had been the architect of a lasting peace, even if that peace meant paying tribute to the Damarsene across our borders with their hungry army — and to the Damarsene alliance with the Pruzians, those mercenary masters of cold warfare.

If the King had carried the Aryx, the Duc could not have killed him, and Lisele would still be alive.

I had more pressing matters at hand. I dropped the Aryx down into my bodice, thanking the gods Arioste had been relatively modest — at least when it came to showing her twin charms. Heartless and fickle, with no more brain than a poisonous serpent, she still had not deserved…that. A cold shudder racked me.

The neckline concealed most of the medallion, leaving only a meaningless curve of copper that was a serpent’s back but might have been anything.

Chill metal settled against my skin as if it belonged there. The Aryx began to throb, softly, taking on the quality of a heartbeat — my own heartbeat, rapid and thready as it was in my own ears. Strangely, it comforted me to have that warmth against my skin.

I ate an apple, and my hands ceased their trembling. The window set high in the wall let westering sunlight through, making golden motes of dust dance in the air. I thought of Tristan d’Arcenne locked in the donjons, and hoped they would not torture him. I thought of him because otherwise I would have to think of Lisele, and her blood on my hands.

I ate another apple, and wiped at my cheeks with a bit of my green velvet dress. Then I combed out my tangled hair and braided it back, weeping afresh because I had twisted Lisele’s hair so many times. I had taught her to braid in the style of di Rocancheil too, and it had been quite the fashion when we were eleven together. By then we had been fast friends, and Lisele had come to trust me as much as a princesse could trust a confidante of noble blood. She was my Princesse and my lady, and I bound to serve her, but she was also my friend, and I tried to be discreet and trustworthy for her.

Yet I failed her when she needed me most. Had I not been standing uselessly, feeling d’Arcenne’s lips on my forehead, I might have been able to…

Do not be ridiculous. They would have killed you as well, and found the Aryx to take to the Duc. You did what you should have, Vianne.

But oh, I did not believe it.

Chapter Three

I did sleep, a thin troubled slumber broken by restless starts whenever I thought I heard a footstep or a mouse scratching. It would not be long before the North Tower was searched as well.

And I dared not sleep too deeply lest I waste the night.

When darkness crept slowly through the windows, I wished I had brought a candle. Yet if I had one, or if I practiced my limited Court sorcery and used a witchlight, how would I wend my way to the donjons without being seen? And if I could reach the warren of prison cells without being remarked, what chance did I have of setting d’Arcenne free? Did the keys he’d given me include a donjon key among them?

I waited in the darkness for what seemed like ages, until the clock in my head — probably thrown off by shock, but the only measure of time I had — told me twas the hour of the planned banquet. Court dines late in summer, and only a touch earlier in late spring; besides, the Duc would be anxious to bring the Palais under his control. I wondered what tale would be given to the Ministers, and to the lords and pages and chivalieri. The women who had not seen the attack on Lisele, of course, would be dead or taken somewhere, whisked out of the way for their own safety. I wondered grimly who would be blamed for the afternoon’s events, where the Duc would pin the conspiracy that had left him King.

He is not King without the Aryx. I left my green velvet dress on the divan and covered it with the dust cloth. The disturbed dust would not hide where I had spent the afternoon, but I felt compelled to conceal what I could.

I used a dry abandoned watercloset to relieve my aching bladder and crept through the North Tower to the servants’ door, again. I listened, my ear pressed against cold wood, for a long, agonizing time, before I unlocked it and stepped out.

The hall was empty.

Now I had only to reach the donjons without being seen.

I had mulled the matter long and hard, and decided I would use the Sculpture Hall, since it ran almost the whole length of the Western Palais and was rarely guarded, being completely enclosed by the King’s Pavilion. There were plenty of niches and passages to hide in. Lisele and I had explored the Palais as children, and I knew not all of it, for there were some places children and women did not go, and passages both secret and forgotten. Yet I knew enough to possibly pass unseen if I wished to devoutly enough.

The Sculpture Hall proved to be under heavy guard by the Duc’s blue-sashed men, so I was forced to use a different route — a dusty garret over the north end of the Sculpture Hall leading to a jumbled, confusing patchwork of servant’s passageways. I kept my ears tuned and had to hide once or twice, and was almost discovered by a fumbling pair of servants eager to find a place for their assignation. From them I learned the whole Palais was at sup in the Coronation Hall, the Court putting on a brave face over the tragedy of the King slain by his own Captain,